Chapter 50. Use 1. Answering the Objections of the Arminians and the Wantons of our Age.
Therefore, you must compare what you hear with what you read, just as the noble Bereans did when they searched the Scriptures to see if what Paul himself preached was true. They were not to accept Paul's preaching without examining it, and they were commended for doing so. God forbid that we should think it strange that people examine what we say. "Try all things, and hold fast that which is good." Search the Scriptures, and compare what is delivered with Scripture, and then, insofar as what is spoken aligns with the rule of Scripture (even if it is not directly quoting the words of Scripture), when it is spoken in the name of God and according to Scripture, it should be received as if God and Christ themselves had spoken it.
We claim no such infallibility as the Papists attribute to the Pope, but we grant all people the liberty to examine our doctrine by Scripture.
Then, God expects, and Christ expects, that it should be received as if God and Christ were speaking.
Chapter 50.
Use 1. Answering the Objections of the Arminians and the Wantons of our Age.
Now then, briefly, hence we have a use of instruction where we have an answer to the objection both of the Arminians and of our late wantons. The Arminians make this objection: when we preach
(sometimes) that all men are naturally dead in sins and trespasses, and there is no free will in man, but man is as void of grace as the dead carcass that lies in the grave is void of natural life. Now they
say, if men are so dead in sins, why do you preach to them? Would it not be a vain thing to go and preach in the churchyard? Would they regard what you say? You preach that all are dead, and that there is no life at all in men to do any good—why do you speak to them? This point answers that objection.
Though it is true that all men are naturally dead in sins, and are, before the Lord, as a dead carrion; there is no dead carrion more loathsome in our eyes than every natural soul is in the eyes of God.
Yet we come and preach to them. Why? Because in our preaching, it is God—God and Christ—who speaks. Though our voice has no power to raise from the dead, the voice of God has power to raise from the dead. If Christ will speak to one who is dead, he shall come forth. As you know, in the 11th chapter of John, when Christ came to Lazarus, he said, "I say to thee, Lazarus, arise." It would be a vain thing for any of us to go to the grave and say, "arise," but if Christ comes, he can raise them immediately. So, we preach to a congregation that is mixed, some who have lain in the grave of sin perhaps for forty years together. Yet when we speak in the name of Christ, and Christ speaks together with us, we may speak to dead souls, for together with the word that is spoken, there goes a power and a life, for it is the word of God (and not the word of man) that breathes forth life.
And again, it is an answer to the objection of our late wantons. They cry out against ministers calling on men for duties and consider them as "duty-mongers." They say, "Why do you call men to act? You tell them they must do this and that, and they must perform duties and humble themselves." They think they have a great objection in this: that because men have no power naturally, therefore it is a vain thing to call upon them to perform duties.